


Memories Burning (Moving Closer)

by coffeehousehaunt



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Dream Sequence, F/F, Not-so-oblique references to torture, References to nonconsensual scientific experimentation, Soul Bond, Super Soldier Serum, That's it, There's an explosion really, Unethical Experimentation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-17
Updated: 2017-10-17
Packaged: 2019-01-18 12:55:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12388512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coffeehousehaunt/pseuds/coffeehousehaunt
Summary: ”You will doextraordinarythings, Kara.” Her eyes search Kara’s, like she’s looking for something in them, imploring, willing what she says to be true.He looks her over, but he doesn’t see her—or, he sees something that isn’t there, an idea he wants to extract from her flesh and purify, shape for himself.”You are extraordinary, Kara.””You’ve given us the next step in our evolution, Kara.””We’re going to do incredible things, Kara. All because of you.”AU where Kara was captured by the Luthors almost immediately after arriving on Earth, and a very sick teenage Alex received a bone marrow transplant made of “synthetic tissue” that was… not so synthetic. But she healed! And developed mysterious superpowers! And was so appreciative of what the Luthors and Cadmus had done that she volunteered as the first in a line of super-soldiers given powers via Kara’s DNA–until she realized that those dreams she’s had of planets she’s never been to, all the things she knew and shouldn’t–are all real, and are all because of this girl who’s been held captive for the last ten-plus years.(References to Lex Luthor’s Awful Science™)





	Memories Burning (Moving Closer)

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Natalia, "Make Us". 
> 
>  
> 
> _Promise you'll stay (Promise you'll stay)_  
>  _Don't fade away_

She’s with her mother, when it happens—it’s become a cue, for her, like the last chorus of a song, or the last loop in a section of code, one of the logic puzzles she played with as a child. 

The last promise anyone ever made to her. The last good memory she has. Her mother’s face goes grave, and Kara knows—not fear, not anticipation, but the memory of pain radiating from within her bones. What comes next; what always comes next, after the inevitable current of consciousness pulls her to the surface. 

The only thing that came after this moment. 

_”You will do_ extraordinary _things, Kara.”_ Her eyes search Kara’s, like she’s looking for something in them, imploring, willing what she says to be true. 

_”Now go.”_ Alura pushes her gently, and Kara turns away, no horror left in her to feel anymore, no betrayal, as she turns and sees the face of the man her mother is handing her over to; no escape pod, just the overeager gleam of eyes as cold and sterile as the laboratory he owns, the low roar of Krypton collapsing in on itself, falling farther and farther away, leaving just the two of them floating in the bay in space. 

_”Humanity owes you their thanks,”_ He says through his predator’s smile, though she knows by now that when he says _“you”_ , he really means _“me”_. _”Lesser men would call you a godsend.”_ He bends close like they’re sharing a secret. _”But we both know the truth.”_ He straightens. 

He looks her over, but he doesn’t see her—or, he sees something that isn’t there, an idea he wants to extract from her flesh and purify, shape for himself. 

_”You are extraordinary, Kara.”_

_”You’ve given us the next step in our evolution, Kara.”_

_”We’re going to do incredible things, Kara. All because of you.”_

She’s wanted it to be true; she’s wanted desperately for it to not be true. To not have given them _this_ , the gifts her mother spoke to her of, gifts that she’s never experienced. Gifts that she doesn’t even know if she has anymore; did they take it all? 

Were those gifts even meant for her? 

_You will do extraordinary things._

Wanting anything has never made a difference. 

The rumble of the world builds beneath their feet, rises to a roar. Louder. So loud. 

Louder than ever, she thinks. Maybe something new.

Always something new. Some new way to extract what he wants from her. 

The pod bay begins to shake; fractures creeping through it like the fractures in Krypton’s surface, and then it crumbles, debris raining around them. She watches her captor’s face disappear in an inferno, still watching her with that hunger, that promise. The certainty that what he wants is there within her. 

Kara doesn’t recognize the lab, at first, until the light breaks through the swirling dust, and she knows the shape of the fixtures, has seen them so many times. 

But one entire wall of the room is gone, collapsed, alarms and shouting flooding through, and a strange red light that makes her tremble, because _No,_ no. That light is gone. 

A figure steps through, shorter than her captor—he always prefers to come visit her in person, she thinks. And he doesn’t wear—that uniform. All black. Doesn’t carry a gun. 

The soldier stops, pulls up her mask. Looks at Kara, stunned. Kara stares back. 

That face. 

The soldier shakes herself. 

“Hey,” She says, kneeling down to look at Kara’s cuffs. She reaches into a pocket on her vest and pulls out a chunk of rock that pulses yellow—from dull to so bright it blinds Kara, even after years of the humans’ bright-white lights. “It’s gonna be okay.” 

The light stabs into Kara’s eyes, crawls along her nerves—floods her veins, soothes the pain, even the memory of it. And then the light dulls before it’s all gone. 

The soldier’s eyes are glowing with the same light—Kara thinks she recognizes it, now; a distant memory. _Sunlight._

Sunlight pours out of the soldier’s eyes and the metal holds firm for a moment. Kara can feel the heat searing into her skin. The soldier swears—then the cuff shatters. 

Each joint. Each cuff. Kara lies shocked—uncuffed for the first time in what feels like her entire life. Unsure if she’s supposed to stand, now. If she _can_ stand, even. 

“Hey.” The soldier kneels down again in front of her. Her eyes flicker over Kara, a little furrow in her brow, something like disbelief in her eyes instead of sunlight. “I can’t believe you’re real.” 

Her eyes are dark, actually. And her hair—

Dark, until the light above shines through it, and it’s deep red. Kara’s breath chokes off. 

_”Danvers! Thirty seconds!”_

The soldier swallows. She meets Kara’s eyes again. “I know you don’t know me,” She says, her voice careful, and Kara doesn’t know what to do with that tone, kind of forgot that it existed; that at some point, someone ever spoke to her like that, like she was something that needed to be handled with care. _Someone_ who needed to be handled with care. 

Someone. 

“I know you don’t know me,” She says, but Kara knows her, she’s sure of it. She’s seen her a thousand times, but she doesn’t know where. One of the doctors that Luthor brought with him sometimes, when he needed another pair of hands, or wanted to show off? Or—the hair; a piece of Krypton? “But you saved my life.” 

_Oh._ No. Kara knows now. 

She was a child, not much older than Kara was at the time. A sick girl. When Luthor first tried to take her gifts from her. 

But she lived. And she was there, a reflection in mirrored metal, in Luthor’s eyes; the place she’d escape to when it was too much. Even when he cut her down to nothing, weaker than any human around her—that presence, as strong as ever. 

There’s something hard in her look, now. A promise. Brighter and hotter and deadlier than all that sunlight Kara can still feel in her skin. 

“I’m going to get you out of here.”


End file.
